VGA Use:
The Lilliput 7" touch screen was installed on two different computer systems in order to test it as both a primary and a secondary display. I first tried it as the secondary display on a full size AMD Athlon XP based computer running an Ati Radeon 9600 AGP card with two VGA outputs. As you can see in the below left image, the desktop was easily extended from my 17" Viewsonic TFT LCD monitor onto the Lilliput, allowing me to have a little place to run my TV tuner application and Trillian instant messenger.
 
Next, I installed the Lilliput onto my mini-ITX system sporting a VIA M10000 Nehemiah motherboard in a Morex Cubid 3688 case. As shown in the above right image, the small scale of the monitor is lost when the only reference is the mini-ITX system next to it. The two components go well with each other aesthetically, and they function together just as well.
The image below shows the screen being put to good use surfing BigBruin.Com and running WinAmp from the M10000 system. The screen is very clear and sharp, the photo does not do it justice, and basic use is extremely simple. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to read text, navigate web pages, and operate applications. The display may support 800x480 resolution, but getting to this setting is easier said than done on a PC. Default monitor resolutions offer 640x480 and 800x600, and in order to try out 800x480 I had to download a trial of Entech's PowerStrip. To be honest, 800x600 looked good to me, and I have stuck with that as my default resolution.
When used in the car, I anticipate multimedia applications being of most interest, and have no concerns that interacting with them would be all that difficult. Custom applications are also out there to make in car use even easier, so interested users may want to check out goodies such as Frodo Player, Media Engine, and MediaCar.
Composite Use:
As a final test of the Lilliput's performance I connected the composite audio and video cables to my home DVD player to view a wide screen format movie, and to hopefully take advantage of the native 800x480 resolution. The screen capture below documents the results (although somewhat fuzzy). The image quality was as to be expected at this point... very clear, sharp, and with respectable brightness and contrast.
As you can see, there is still a bit of black on the top and bottom of the screen, despite the movie being played in wide screen mode. The OSD indicates that the movie is running at 640x350, which is roughly a 16:9 ratio, and putting it into letter box mode almost makes more black than image on the screen.
This portion of the review was also the first time I experienced the speaker built in to the back. Despite the cables being connected to a stereo audio source, the single speaker is responsible for all the sound. I wasn't expecting much from the speaker, and I wasn't dissapointed. It was clear, but not particularly strong, and the bass and treble definitely lacked emphasis. In general, I don't imagine many people running a carputer or other multimedia setup are counting on this speaker, so it just serves as a basic extra that doesn't get in the way by not being used.
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